NFL touts 13.2 million viewers for NFL Draft first round
Credit: Kirby Lee-Imagn Images Perhaps more than any other television rating, the NFL Draft is the hardest to parse out given the myriad of broadcasts, both linear and digital, available to viewers. For that reason, it’s difficult to compare NFL Draft viewership to most other television programs. That won’t stop the league from touting strong viewership, however.
And across ABC, ESPN, NFL Network, ESPN Deportes, Disney+, Hulu, the ESPN app, NFL+, TikTok, YouTube, and X, the league says it averaged 13. 2 million viewers during the first round of the NFL Draft on Thursday night. According to the NFL, it was the third most-watched first round on record.
First Round Viewership 1st round coverage of the 2026 @NFLDraft averaged 13. 2 million across all linear & digital platforms 3rd most-watched Day 1 ever & 2nd most-watched since 2020 Record crowd of 805,000 fans across all 3 days in Pittsburgh Release:… pic. twitter.
com/q0q3149Rwx — NFL Media (@NFLMedia) April 27, 2026 Of course, it’s nearly impossible to figure out exactly how the NFL is measuring much of this viewership, which includes the audience tuned in for The Pat McAfee Show Draft Spectacular on YouTube, TikTok, and X. Viewership on those platforms is not measured by Nielsen, the audience measurement firm whose ratings are treated as currency within the television business. So an aggregate audience of 13.
2 million viewers for Day 1 of the draft cannot be treated as equivalent to a program earning the same audience solely through Nielsen ratings. Ironically, that exact scenario would apply to Round 1 of last year’s draft, which averaged 13. 2 million viewers across the three linear networks (ABC, ESPN, NFL Network), but did not include digital viewership like McAfee’s show.